Michael Oku — also known as the O.J.M.O. — recently spoke with Andrew Thompson, where the longest-reigning RevPro Cruiserweight Champion spoke about his match against Will OsPreay at RevPro High Stakes 2022.
“So, I did and I didn’t [have the feeling that me and Ospreay did something special at High Stakes 2022],” Oku said. “I guess I’ll say not to the level that it had and I was definitely like, ‘Okay, yeah, this is special for sure. You can feel it when you’re in that ring and when you’re surrounded by the crowd of York Hall. When the first bell rang, when the bell rang, I was like, ‘Okay, they’re here for it, they’re here for it’ so already, you’re like, ‘They’re on our side and we just have to meet their expectations’ that I really feel like we [met] it.”
Oku went on to say that he believes the pair exceeded the expectations of not only the audience, but their own expectations of how the match might go.
“I think we exceeded my expectations of how the match would be because in my head, I was just like, ‘What if this doesn’t work? What if this doesn’t?’ Because in the York Hall matches or main events, when the fans are looking forward to a match and I’ve read or seen them leave kind of leave a little bit disappointed with either the quality of the match or the finish and I was just like, ‘Man…’ that was my main thought so, for it go as well as it did, I was just like, ‘Phew,’ and then you get congratulations when you come backstage from the wrestlers and [stuff like] that,” said Oku. “‘Okay, that’s good, that’s good’ but then, you don’t know the level that people are like, ‘Oh, this is one of the best things I’ve ever seen. It’s the best match I’ve ever seen live.’ Just like, ‘This is one of the matches of the year.’ I [was] just like, it’s all very weird to hear. It’s very, very weird to hear for me for sure.”
Oku also touched on now being the longest-reigning RevPro Cruiserweight Champion (at 740+ days and counting), a feat that has pushed him past the likes of Ospreay and Finn Balor.
“They [future RevPro Cruiserweight Champions] better hope for a pandemic. They better hope for their own pandemic [to break his title reign record],” Oku said. “A new one [can] come around and help it and that’s the thing, I feel like that kind of helps and so I was always in my mind of, ‘Ah, I’m gonna break this reign but there was this pandemic happening that had it’ so also, my focus as well was like the number of defenses and I got to have the most defenses and I think I overtook the record number of defenses when I beat Chris Ridgeway in London but then I had way more defenses since then so like, now that I’ve had the record number of defenses, I do feel like, well okay, now it’s solidified that I can say I’m the best Cruiserweight Champ in RevPro history because of the things I’ve done that we can get onto like holding the tag titles and challenging for the heavyweight title like I’ve done.
“I feel like doing those things while being Cruiserweight Champion and then defending it and doing double duty on multiple shows and multiple big shows as well mind you. I feel like those things are things that the other champs can’t say they did and I’ve done and yeah, I just think that the argument’s there to say that I’m the best Cruiserweight Champion of all-time. Not only the longest reigning but the most defenses.”
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